Congressional elections are important to the legislative branch of the United States. The branch deals with the checks and balances of the government. There are two equal powers of congress: the House of Representatives and Senate
The House is intended to serve closer for the people of the United States. Therefore there are many seats in the House, but members are elected every two-years. The amount of seats reserved for each state depends on the size. This means a census is taken every 10 years to account for the population changes in each state.
The Senate is intended to represent the states, so that smaller states can be accounted for. Two senators are elected for each state. They were originally selected by state legislatures, but then the 17th Amendment in 1913 ruled that the people directly elect. This is what is called the plurality vote and the state electorate vote. Each senator serves for six-years, with one-third of the Senate members up for reelection every two years.
The process of elections is done by election administrators, usually county or city officials and clerks. They are charged with making sure the voter is registered and eligible, they administer elections, and tabulate or count the votes. This process takes careful planning and difficult work.
After taking a year to determine which registered voter is eligible and making sure that all candidates are up, they must design a clear ballot for every ethnicity in that state. While there currently are no national standard ballot forms, the Voting Rights Act states that election administrators must provide ballots in different languages according to the population of non-English speakers in that state. Next, election officials must set up voting machines honed to every ballot; each machine needs more maintenance election officials in the 10-15 hours on election day.
The quality of equipment and ballot forms generally depend upon the local economy and tax base, seeing as local taxes tend to spend more on school funds, fire services, police, recreation etc. There are different voting machines available. The use of paper ballots marking “X” to a candidate’s name has largely been replaced with paper that can be scanned mechanically. “Punch-card” machines, where holes are made next to the candidate’s name inside a machine caused the controversy in the 2000 U.S. presidential election in Florida. Because of this, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) in 2002 to replace punch-card and lever machines. If a voter will be gone from their state during elections, they may mail their vote. A new addition is “early voting” where voting machines are set up at public places three weeks before election day so that people can easily vote at their convenience. However all votes are counted when all polls are closed at the end of election day.
Congressional elections are important to the legislative branch of the United States. The branch deals with the checks and balances of the government. There are two equal powers of congress: the House of Representatives and Senate
The House is intended to serve closer for the people of the United States. Therefore there are many seats in the House, but members are elected every two-years. The amount of seats reserved for each state depends on the size. This means a census is taken every 10 years to account for the population changes in each state.
The Senate is intended to represent the states, so that smaller states can be accounted for. Two senators are elected for each state. They were originally selected by state legislatures, but then the 17th Amendment in 1913 ruled that the people directly elect. This is what is called the plurality vote and the state electorate vote. Each senator serves for six-years, with one-third of the Senate members up for reelection every two years.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/07/27/the-cnn-100-full-list/?fbid=XBOQROAhtZO
Though the House of Representatives elections are in by November, this article is about the control of power and an opinionated list on what is to come next year.
U.S. Elections Procedures
The process of elections is done by election administrators, usually county or city officials and clerks. They are charged with making sure the voter is registered and eligible, they administer elections, and tabulate or count the votes. This process takes careful planning and difficult work.
After taking a year to determine which registered voter is eligible and making sure that all candidates are up, they must design a clear ballot for every ethnicity in that state. While there currently are no national standard ballot forms, the Voting Rights Act states that election administrators must provide ballots in different languages according to the population of non-English speakers in that state. Next, election officials must set up voting machines honed to every ballot; each machine needs more maintenance election officials in the 10-15 hours on election day.
The quality of equipment and ballot forms generally depend upon the local economy and tax base, seeing as local taxes tend to spend more on school funds, fire services, police, recreation etc. There are different voting machines available. The use of paper ballots marking “X” to a candidate’s name has largely been replaced with paper that can be scanned mechanically. “Punch-card” machines, where holes are made next to the candidate’s name inside a machine caused the controversy in the 2000 U.S. presidential election in Florida. Because of this, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) in 2002 to replace punch-card and lever machines. If a voter will be gone from their state during elections, they may mail their vote. A new addition is “early voting” where voting machines are set up at public places three weeks before election day so that people can easily vote at their convenience. However all votes are counted when all polls are closed at the end of election day.
http://www.fox4kc.com/news/wdaf-story-joco-election-machines-072710,0,2795262.story
This article is about touch-screen voting machines in Kansas that are causing some problems for a voter. New technology can make the elections process easier, but small faults in the system is the reason why we have the HAVA